I. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a mouth guard to minimize teeth grinding during sleep and reduce TMJ and other jaw-related problems.
II. Description of Material Art
Many persons have the tendency of grinding their teeth while sleeping. Such teeth grinding is involuntary and disadvantageously results in undesirable wear of the teeth, TMJ, and other jaw-related problems.
In order to minimize the damage created by the grinding of the teeth, there have been a number of previously known mouth guards which are positioned within the mouth between the teeth on the upper and lower jaws. These previously known mouth guards separate the upper and lower jaws from each other during sleep and thus prevent the teeth from grinding against each other involuntarily during sleep.
The previously known mouth guards, however, have not proven entirely satisfactory in operation. Although the previously known mouth guards effectively eliminate teeth grinding by separating the upper and lower teeth during sleep, they do not eliminate or even significantly reduce involuntary occlusion of the teeth during sleep against the mouth guard. Consequently, while these previously known mouth guards effectively prevent erosion of the teeth caused by grinding during sleep, such guards provide little, if any, relief from temporomandibular joint disease (TMJ) and other jaw-related problems associated with teeth grinding.
A still further disadvantage of these previously known mouth guards is that such mouth guards are typically custom molded to the teeth. As such, they include a full arch tray extending around all of the teeth on the upper or lower jaw. However, the arcuate shape of the mouth of the human adult varies from one adult to the other. For example, in some adults the canines are much more closely spaced together laterally while in other adults the canines are spaced laterally apart from each other by an amount greater than a typical adult human. In these cases, the canines of the human adult do not register with the tray. When this happens, either the tray cannot be used for that particular person, or a modification of the tray by the person is required. Unfortunately, few people are able to correctly modify the mouth guard to fit their own teeth.